The present application claims priority from Japanese Application No. 198933/2000 filed Jun. 30, 2000.
The present invention relates to a method for servicing and maintaining heat supply equipment provided with a boiler or the like. More particularly, the invention relates to a method for servicing and maintaining heat supply equipment, which can fulfill 24-hour response and which includes preventive maintenance for securing safety and security.
For servicing and maintenance of boilers in heat supply equipment, maintenance stations are provided at individual controlled areas, and a serviceman disposed at each of these maintenance stations performs the servicing and maintenance of the boiler. When any one of the boilers has halted due to occurrence of an abnormality, a telephone contact will be made from a person in charge of management of the boiler to the maintenance station, and a serviceman will take measures based on the contents of this contact.
However, it has been often the case that only telephone contact could not make the cause of the abnormality clear, or going to the site and finding the cause would take long time, or that even if the cause is determined, the serviceman does not have replacement parts and so needs setting out again. Further, when the serviceman is on the way to the site or checking for the cause of the abnormality, the boiler is left halted. Further, if the person in charge of management is late in finding the halt of the boiler, the halt period would be elongated resultantly. Like this, if the halt period of the boiler is elongated, production factories or the like would incur a lot of loss. Therefore, the boilers need to be prevented from occurrence of abnormalities to the best possible, and besides, if an abnormality has occurred, it is necessary to take a prompt countermeasure.
Abnormalities of the boiler can occur during the night or on holidays of the maintenance station. Therefore, it is desirable that maintenance stations be ready for prompt countermeasures over 24 hours. For this purpose, there arises a need of increasing the number of servicemen at the maintenance station.
Accordingly, an object of the present invention is to fulfill a so-called preventive maintenance, i.e. a maintenance for preventing occurrences of abnormalities in advance, securely and efficiently in heat supply equipment provided with boilers or the like, and to fulfill a prompt countermeasure even with occurrence of an abnormality so that the resultant halt time can be made as short as possible. A further object of the invention is to fulfill 24-hour support with the least staff efficiently.
In order to achieve the above object, in a first aspect of the present invention, there is provided a method for servicing and maintaining heat supply equipment, which includes making a servicing and maintenance contract to implement equipment performance maintenance, function maintenance, abnormality recovery and a diagnosis for preventive maintenance of the heat supply equipment, providing a communication network of the heat supply equipment, a first computer of a control station and a second computer of a control center communicatable thereamong via communication means, and implementing contents of the servicing and maintenance contract based on information obtained by communications in this network, the method comprising the steps of: upon occurrence of an abnormality, performing a sequence of processes that: when the first computer receives abnormality occurrence data automatically transmitted from the heat supply equipment, the control station confirms contents of the abnormality occurrence data and requests detailed information as to the abnormality occurrence data from the heat supply equipment, receives the information, the control station analyzes the abnormality occurrence data and the detailed information and, based on results of this analysis, issues an instruction for dispatch of a serviceman or for recovery by a person in charge of management of the heat supply equipment; in a case where the control station makes no response such as in nighttime or on holidays, transferring the abnormality occurrence data from the first computer to the second computer, and by the control center instead of the control station, performing the sequence of processes, to thereby fulfill the contents of the servicing and maintenance contract over 24 hours a day; and for execution of the diagnosis, obtaining information relating to the diagnosis of the heat supply equipment via the communication means and performing an analysis of the obtained information.
In a second aspect of the invention, the method for servicing and maintaining heat supply equipment further includes, in a periodic inspection for fulfilling the contents of the servicing and maintenance contract, obtaining information as to inspection items in advance via the communication means and analyzing the obtained information, so that possible places of object equipment units that need an emphatic inspection or possible places that need parts replacement can be narrowed down before the serviceman goes for the periodic inspection.
In a third aspect of the invention, the method for servicing and maintaining heat supply equipment further comprises periodically requesting and receiving operating data and heat control data from the heat supply equipment so as to confirm whether or not the communication means is in a normal state and, as required, transferring and storing the two types of data from the heat supply equipment into the first computer of the control station.
In a fourth aspect of the invention, the method for servicing and maintaining heat supply equipment further comprises: totaling the operating data and the heat control data and offering an analysis result or a heat balance report based on this totalization to the servicing and maintenance contractor.
Next, embodiments of the present invention are described. The servicing and maintaining method of the invention is used for heat supply equipment provided with boilers or the like, where the boilers include various kinds of boilers such as steam boiler, hot water boiler, heat medium boiler and the like. The heat supply equipment includes equipment for supplying cold and heat, such as cooling and heating machines. Further, the servicing and maintaining method of the invention is applicable also to equipment such as water treatment systems or the like additionally provided to the boilers.
First of all, for the implementation of servicing and maintenance of heat supply equipment, a servicing and maintenance contract is made with the owner of the heat supply equipment or user (hereinafter, referred to as xe2x80x9cservicing and maintenance contractorxe2x80x9d). This servicing and maintenance contract provides for implementation of equipment performance maintenance, function maintenance, abnormality recovery and a diagnosis for preventive maintenance of the heat supply equipment. That is, the contract provides for maintaining the equipment in a successful state (high efficiency state), maintaining the proper functions of the equipment by preventing the equipment from halting due to occurrence of any abnormality, and recovering the equipment, even upon occurrence of some abnormality, to the normal state immediately. Further, as a diagnosis for preventive maintenance, the contract provides for performing a periodic inspection, for example, on a four-month basis.
The heat supply equipment and a first computer of the control station as well as a second computer of the control center are communicatably connected to each other via communication means. That is, the heat supply equipment is provided with a computer to be connected to the first computer and the second computer, where this computer is given by computers of individual units of equipment or a computer that integrates together those individual units. Then, the contents of the servicing and maintenance contract are implemented according to information from the mutual communications. In this connection, as the control stations, maintenance stations at which a serviceman is disposed play the role of the maintenance stations, while the control stations are provided at individual controlled areas. Also, the control center is intended to integrally support the individual control stations, and provided at a single place or a plurality of places. That is, in the daytime on weekdays, each of the control stations is ready for response according to information sent from the heat supply equipment. In the nighttime on weekdays and all days on holidays, the control center is ready for response, where 24-hour response with the least staff is enabled. For communications, general telephone lines and exclusive lines are used, where these lines may be either wire type or wireless type.
Next, processes for implementing the contents of the servicing and maintenance contract based on the information from the heat supply equipment is described in detail.
First, as a first process, when an abnormality has occurred to the heat supply equipment, abnormality occurrence data is transmitted automatically from the heat supply equipment to the first computer, and this abnormality occurrence data is received by the first computer. The abnormality occurrence data is classified into abnormality data and prediction data. The abnormality data is intended to make it known that the heat supply equipment is halted due to actual occurrence of an abnormality. For example, occurrence of a non-ignition or occurrence of a low water level corresponds to this abnormality data. The prediction data, on the other hand, does not involve immediately halting the heat supply equipment, but makes it known that there is a high potentiality of halt of the heat supply equipment due to occurrence of an abnormality in a few days. For example, a power degradation of the feed water pump corresponds to this prediction data. If the power of the feed pump has degraded, a low water level becomes more likely to occur.
Accordingly, by automatically receiving the abnormality occurrence data, even when the person in charge of management of the heat supply equipment is late in finding a halt of the heat supply equipment, it becomes possible for the control station side to know without delay the halt of the heat supply equipment and make an immediate response. Also, by receiving not only the abnormality data but also the prediction data, it becomes possible to take a countermeasure before the heat supply equipment is halted due to occurrence of an abnormality in the heat supply equipment.
As a second process, the control station, on receiving the abnormality occurrence data, confirms the contents of the received abnormality occurrence data and further requests and receives detailed information associated with the abnormality occurrence data from the heat supply equipment. That is, the control station transmits a request signal for detailed information to the heat supply equipment by operating the first computer. Then, in response to this request signal, the detailed information is returned from the heat supply equipment.
As a third process, the control station analyzes the abnormality occurrence data and the detailed information and, based on a result of this analysis, issues instructions for the dispatch of a serviceman or the recovery to the person in charge of management of the heat supply equipment. By so doing, the control station can be informed as to what operating state the heat supply equipment is currently, without going to the place where the heat supply equipment is installed. Thus, the control station is enabled to immediately instruct the serviceman or the person in charge of management about a proper countermeasure.
Accordingly, it becomes possible in more cases to achieve the recovery by telephone instructions to the person in charge of management of the heat supply equipment, so that the time and labor for dispatch of the serviceman can be reduced and besides that the halt time of the heat supply equipment can be shortened to a large extent. Further, in cases where the serviceman has to be dispatched to the site, since parts or the like necessary for repair can be prepared by specifically determining the cause of an abnormality in advance, the serviceman is allowed to immediately begin repairing at the site and, besides, do not need to be dispatched again.
For this third process, when the decision can be made based on only the analysis result of the abnormality occurrence data, it is possible to omit the reception of detailed information.
Further, as a fourth process, when the control station makes no response in the nighttime or on holidays or the like, the abnormality occurrence data is transferred from the first computer to the second computer, and the control center performs the second process and the third process instead of the control station. That is, when the recovery can be achieved by a telephone instruction, the control center instructs the person in charge of management of the heat supply equipment of the recovery. When the dispatch of a serviceman is necessary, an emergency contact with the serviceman in charge at each control station is made from the control center, and the serviceman in charge fulfills the response. Accordingly, the contents of the servicing and maintenance contract are implementable over 24 hours with the least staff efficiently.
With regard to the control center, in the case where the serviceman at the maintenance station will be absent in the daytime on weekdays, a control station of a neighboring area may be assigned to serve as the control center and fulfill a support function. The case where xe2x80x9cthe control station makes no responsexe2x80x9d includes a case where no response can be made due to the absence of a serviceman or other reasons, and a case where it is previously set so as to make no responses as in the nighttime on weekdays or all day on holidays. Further, with respect to the method of transfer, it may also be arranged that the setting as to whether to transfer can be switched by operating the first computer, or that if no operation is done in the first computer within a specified time period after receiving the abnormality occurrence data, then the transfer is automatically effected. Furthermore, the form of transfer includes one in which the abnormality occurrence data is transmitted from the heat supply equipment to the second computer without using the first computer.
Further, as a fifth process, for the diagnosis, information as to the diagnosis of the heat supply equipment, such as the abnormality occurrence data as well as later-described operating data or heat control data, is obtained via the communication means, and then the obtained information is analyzed. That is, for the execution of the diagnosis for preventive maintenance, necessary information is obtainable at any time necessary.
In periodic maintenances (to be executed, for example, every four months) to implement the contents of the servicing and maintenance contract, the fifth process is performed, by which information as to the inspection items is obtained in advance via the communication means, and then the obtained information is analyzed. By so doing, it is enabled to narrow the possible places that need an emphatic inspection or the possible places that need parts replacement with respect to equipment units targeted for the periodic inspection. As a result, the man-hours necessary for the periodic inspection can be reduced to a large extent.
Further, by requesting and receiving operating data and heat control data from the heat supply equipment periodically (for example, every month), it is checked whether or not the communication means is in the normal state. By so doing, the abnormality of the communication means can be detected earlier, so that mutual communications by the communication means can be performed securely. Then, as required, the two types of data are transferred and stored from the computer of the heat supply equipment into the first computer of the control station. Accordingly, data storage means attached to the computer of the heat supply equipment may be given by one which is relatively smaller in capacity and lower in price. It is noted here that data as to the number of ignitions or burning time or the like are received as the operating data, while data as to the operating efficiency or water tube temperature or the like are received as the heat control data.
The received operating data and heat control data are then totaled, and analysis results or heat balance reports based on this totalization are offered to the servicing and maintenance contractor. That is, the totalization of the two types of data is executed periodically (e.g., every month), and analysis results or heat balance reports of the periodic totalization are sent to the servicing and maintenance contractor as a periodical report (monthly report). For example, operating efficiency, amount of evaporation, use amount of fuel and the like are reported. The sending of the periodical report is implemented by mail, facsimile, electronic mail and the like. Like this, by periodically offering the analysis results or the heat balance report to the servicing and maintenance contractor, the servicing and maintenance contractor is allowed to easily know the status of operation of the heat supply equipment and therefore use the heat supply equipment with the sense of ease.
As shown above, with this constitution, preventive maintenance for the heat supply equipment can be achieved securely and efficiently, so that measures are taken before abnormalities occur to the heat supply equipment so that the heat supply equipment can be operated without being halted. Moreover, even if an abnormality has occurred, a prompt countermeasure can be taken so that the halt time can be shortened as much as possible. Further, the man-hours needed to perform service and maintenance can be shortened to a large extent and besides the service and maintenance of high efficiency can be achieved. Furthermore, 24-hour response can be fulfilled with the least staff.